Page 78 of Please Save Me

After all, our blonde hair and blue eyes were all that separated us from the rest of the family.

The fluorescent lights flickered just as my attention settled on a box of black dye. I hesitated for a beat before picking it up. The cardboard package was small but weighty, and the front had a woman who looked far too happy for a hair dye package. I scanned over the text like it would tell me this wasn’t a terrible idea.

Permanent hair color. Deepest Blue-Black.

The color reminded me of a raven’s feathers. I pulled out a part of my bangs, examining the sandy strands. It’d be a change… one I wanted to do. But what if it looked bad? Was getting disownedworththe risk of coloring my hair?

I weighed the pros and cons for a moment before remembering I could just shave my head if things went south.

With a deep breath, I placed the dye in the red shopping basket hanging from my forearm. I should have just taken my bounty and left, but seeing as I plannedto ruin everything I’d worked for over the last few years, I might as well get a snack too.

I wandered through the aisles until I came upon a wall of candy.

Normally, I avoided all artificial dyes and excess sugar. Because of this, I couldn’t even remember what candy tasted like, let alone which ones I liked.

But I remembered the first time I visited Lyon to see Mason. Cameron’s spawn had made it impossible for her to keep anything down for nearly a week, and all she could think about on my first night there was blue raspberry flavored anything.

So, I ended up finding something that fit the criteria. Mason ate so much candy that her teeth turned blue. She asked if I wanted to try some, and my first thought was to reject her. But I didn’t want to be anything but perfect when we first started dating, so I said yes, and she kissed me.

Her lips were sweet and sticky, and she tasted like the blue-flavored sugar she craved. To this day,that wasmy favorite kiss with Mason.

It wasn’t perfect, or rehearsed, or even anything I was in a rush to do again. But…it washer.

My heart ached at the memory, but I tried to push it away.

I grabbed a bag of blue sour cubes and a pack of gummy fish because I vaguely remembered those being my favorite as a kid.

With my bounty in hand, I headed toward the self-checkout area. I just hoped I’d have the courage to use the hair dye.

I lay on the carpet of my living room, hands folded on my stomach, trying to decipher invisible pictures in the plaster on my ceiling. Convincing myself to dye my hair was the easy part.

All that took was a little… herbal courage. Every time I thought it was a bad idea, I took a drag of my pen, and after enough THC entered my system, my doubts went out the window. But now, as my lips tingled and I wondered what it’d be like to be a speck of dust just floating in the wind, I still could not force myself to eat the candy I purchased.

I turned my head slightly so I could stare at the bag of sour cubes.

Being stoned and snacks went hand in hand. That was a little fact I learned after Mason left. Her disappearance because of her mom’s death was something I hadn’t accounted for, and itdestroyedme to the point I needed to take a semester off school.

That, on top of the personal effects Holly’s death had on me, was more than I was equipped to deal with.

Because of all that, I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t breathe, I couldn’t eat. I’d once heard that someone could die of a broken heart, and I never believed it until that moment. No one understood my anguish, especially because Mason and I were barely friends at the time, and I’d rarely ever talked to Mason’s mom.

Eventually, my mom got sick of my moping and decided to slip me edibles. She told me the law always had some gray areas, and marijuana was one of them. It was better to have me get a little high than starve to death.

That trick worked back then, but now I couldn’t force myself to ingest the cubes of sugar, artificial dye, and God knows what else. Plus, even if they ended up tasting okay, I’d never like the flavor of blue raspberry as much as I enjoyed it on Mason’s lips.

Maybe I should just kill—nope.Badthought. Not doing that.

I brought the plastic mouthpiece between my lips and pressed the silver button in the center of the pen. The golden liquid in the cartridge crackled as the taste of weed danced across my tongue and into my lungs. It was supposed to taste like apricot jelly, but it wasn’t even close.

After inhaling too deep, I coughed out the vapor in one big cloud. But it didn’t stop there. I propped myself up on my elbows as I hacked. After nearly a minute, my coughing fit stopped, and I caught my breath….Andtook another drag off my vape. Just much smaller this time.

How wasthiswhat Mason wanted me to be?

That thought almost consumed me as I laid back on the carpet. I was willing to give her perfection, but all she wanted was a mess. Was she secretly the type to use others to make herself feel better? She never had been before.

A knock at the door pulled me from my thoughts.

My heart thumped at the idea of Mason standing outside my apartment and waiting to see me. But… the chances she was awake were slim to none. Her pregnancy had officially progressed to the point where she could barely stay awake. Growing a human was hard work, and that hard work had left my poor girl exhausted.

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